The present invention relates to an apparatus for reproducing musical accompaniment information and for recording musical accompaniment information, and more particularly to a musical accompaniment playing apparatus and a musical accompaniment recording medium to which a MIDI(Musical Instrument Digital Interface) is applied.
Hitherto, as the musical accompaniment playing apparatus, there are known the playing apparatus in the form of a laser video disk and the playing apparatus in the form of a compact disk.
The apparatus for reproducing musical accompaniment information in the form of a laser video disk (LVD) comprises a LVD automatic changer for accommodating therein a plurality of laser video disks serving as the musical accompaniment information recording medium and reproducing them, a commander for controlling the LVD automatic changer to allow it to select a desired laser video disk in the LVD automatic changer by a request inputted from a control unit, an amplifier and a speaker for outputting a reproduced audio signal as a sound, an image display unit for displaying a reproduced image signal as an image, and a microphone for changing a voice sung to an audio sound to output it to the amplifier. The amplifier mixes the audio signal from the LVD automatic changer and the audio signal of the voice sung from the microphone to output a mixed signal to the speaker.
On the other hand, the apparatus for reproducing musical accompaniment information in the form of a compact disk (CD) comprises a CD automatic changer for accommodating therein a plurality of CDs and reproducing them, a commander for controlling the CD automatic changer to allow it to select a desired CD in the CD automatic changer by a request inputted from a control unit, an amplifier and a speaker for outputting a reproduced audio signal as a sound, a graphic decoder for converting graphic data reproduced from subcode data in the CD to an image signal, a graphic display unit for displaying the image signal as an image, and a microphone for changing a voice sung to an audio signal to output it to the amplifier. The amplifier mixes the audio signal from the CD automatic changer and the audio signal of the voice sung from the microphone to output a mixed signal to the speaker.
By employing such configurations, a user can sing a song by the musical accompaniment and also appreciate an image at the same time.
However, in the media for recording musical accompaniment information and the apparatuses for reproducing musical accompaniment information in these conventional forms, in the case where a new music is delivered to the apparatus, it is required to deliver the laser video disks or CDs by human labor. Accordingly, there was the problem that it takes much time for delivery of a new music at a remote place, etc.
Further in the automatic changer, a large space was required for the purpose of accommodating a large number of disks.
Furthermore, in the case of singing a song, when an attempt is made to allow the key of the musical accompaniment to be in correspondence with a singing ability of a singer, a key controller was separately installed.
In addition, in the conventional recording media and apparatuses, once a musical performance begins, it was impossible to play a music with an intermediate portion of a music being skipped. For example, suppose the case where a music is composed of three parts. At this time, in the case of attempting to jump from the second part immediately to the ending with the third part being skipped, even if the function for performing the search operation is given, time lag is produced by a time required for the search operation, there results disagreement with the stream of music. Further, if the search operation is caused to be stopped on the way, the ending would not be played, resulting in dull musical accompaniment performance. Thus, development of a music as expected cannot be provided.
On the other hand, recording media such as disks or tapes, etc. on which a music for accompaniment is recorded are apt to be copied. As a result, there were instances where a trouble at the time of the collection of the charge by deliverer of delivery of software and/or that in relation to the copyright thereof occur.